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CHAPTER 8

 

Making Chaos out of Order, and
Unintelligibility out of Comprehension

by WILL

 

see with this Chapter’s emphasis on practical fields, Supplement 5
on the Practical Power of Predestinative Truth in the Realm of Salvation

 

Fields of Application of Predestination and Liberty

 

What happens socially and in the realms of ratiocination, when the love and sovereignty together of Almighty God are wrested from their regal role in harmonious thoughts, and spat upon ?

 

Two elements are now noted. One is the situation in cloning (of humans;) and the other is that in that aged and never sprouting chestnut, ‘chance’, really simply the absence, real or assumed, of direct interposition of purpose into a situation ordered according to some scenario, sequence or organisation; for without these, there is not even anything describable, like chaos, a term signifying SOMETHING according to a discernible procedure.

 

As to cloning humans, one hears the most inane seeming talk, as if the bodily apparatus were the man, as if the means were the purpose, as if the equipment were the agent. The operation of the human spirit, noted in some detail in Chapter 5 above, makes a very different result out of one obtained with the same equipment, compared with another. There is NOT ALONE the equipment environment for the human will, mind and purposes: there is the intent of the heart. This is not programmed in, and varies with the winds (of doctrine, culture, philosophy, desire, convenience, aspiration, asininity and so on cf. It Bubbles Ch. 9). The actuality of a man lies not so much in his looks, his persona or his guile, as in his purposes and intentions, his linkages (with God, the devil, evil spirits, evil purposes, evil geniuses or dull apathy) which are, or can be transformative, rendering beautiful what was in discord, and harmonious what was in internal dissent (or for that matter, where the scope of the transformation is sufficiently large, international dissent).

 

Cloning organs from non-embryonic stem-cells may be a work of mercy; yet seeking to make what in the end is merely a piano for the pianist with all this fanfare, is merely to sidestep the Creator and to ignore that HIS is the predestination, not ours.  We merely, at  most, fiddle with the crate in which the man comes. The spirit of man is not discernible in equipment; it merely uses it (cf. It Bubbles … Ch. 9, Little Things Ch. 5, SMR pp. 348ff., Galloping Events Ch. 7, News 152, Divine Agenda Ch. 6, Cascade of Truth… Ch. 10, Beauty of Holiness Chs. 3, 4, 5, 6).

 

  Note also that the Supplement at the End of this Volume is pertinent to this arena, comprising Ch. 2, Case of Truth.

Extract A

 from Ancient Words, Modern Deeds Ch. 1
 

NEWS 153

CLONING, CLOWNING,
THERAPY AND APOSTASY^*1

The beauty shown is  of what falls in its accustomed path, providing material for joy and use;
but we do not make the mountains themselves! or the earth... or ourselves! (Psalm 100).

SEE ALSO NEWS 166, and Sparkling Life ... Ch. 6.

CLONING, the reproduction of a descendant or descendants asexually from a single cell in an organism, indicates Webster's dictionary.

As it is turning out, the concept seems to have moved in practical emphasis, from an egg cell in a sheep, with the DNA removed by delicate pipette suction, and a donor DNA inserted, leading to the famous Dolly, now equipped with offspring. The intention then moves, through what has been described as making the donor cell dormant, then placing this DNA in the "empty egg 'shell' ''. This avoided paternal and maternal sexual components in the reproduction action. The intention, we read in Reader's Digest, April 2001, is later simply to take a few skin cells, and then to convert the resultant action into the desired organ "directly".

If technical capacity were available to do that, it would remove to fundamental obstacles to this form of therapy (and what else it might be, can be discussed later).
 
 

DIRECT ORGANS ?

What then would be the case if DIRECT organs could be manipulated into existence, using the divine created technology to achieve this ?

It would mean:

1) that no embryo was created, in which human life was resident, thus avoiding murder as the method of helping in therapy, certainly of a radical kind, those in need of replacement organs in order to live. In this were however the case, and such action were to be taken, then the moral declivity would be this, that you create murder in order to save life. It would be a considerable, even reckless advance on the current practice of killing embryos, exceedingly difficult to differentiate from simple murder when the entire nervous system is present, or its substance, in abortion, so well exposed by Drs Francis Schaeffer and Koop, the later once Surgeon-General in the USA, in their book, Whatever Happened to the Human Race ?

In this, they detail the salty death crinkling of the poisoned child, or the dismemberment by internalised slashing and so on. It is not pretty. When this is done for convenience or mere desire, it does raise the interesting question, WHERE is the human race ? WHAT is it coming to, and HOW can millions of such abominations occur without outcries of heart ? or is conscience sedated!  Is it then not to be any more the HUMANE race, and is 'human' to become a sort of salty and crumpled, crinkled parallel to the aborted child (in the salt method) ?

To take it further and actually HAVE a living child, and then murder it, dismember it, use it while it lives and so on, would be murder or worse, so much worse it is perhaps unnecessary at this stage to recount what it would be. However this could be done! The techniques for asexual production, by manipulating divine procedures provided, may become available.

What else however, would it mean if direct organ production could be asexually achieved in this sort of way ? The second improvement would be this:

2)  that  man thus avoided the concept of using the mechanisms, the contrivances, the technical facilities which God made for reproduction, to achieve new beings. It would avoid the case where, with man's limited knowledge and without permission, he tried to make from this automated structuring which along with our minds God created, some altered variant, if not in result perhaps, then in fundamental procedure. He would avoid the contemptuous concept of seeking simply to further procreation asexually.

That is, if one uses again Webster on the term  procreate, 'to beget or generate': then this is not a simple contradiction in terms, but a qualification. This 'pro' creation, or creation on behalf of God, in such a style that it is by His provision of means that the engendering occurs, becomes an asexual one, a generating not with the expressly made sexually reproductive organs, but with the organ, the mind, to cause some of the levers to be pulled, some of the procedures to be activated which we have never made and which we understand but partly.

With direct organ creation, if this were achieved and achievable, then such a folly might be avoided. But perhaps this cannot be achieved ? or some would like to short-circuit it, or not wait for it ? What if it were the case that the whole structure of a human were asexually made by manipulation of the divine structure by cloning ? Suppose it done, what then ?
 
 

BUT MORE THAN THIS ?

That it would be interference with His provisions is undeniable. That there is nothing in the Bible to authorise it, is similarly the case. What would happen if you took dad's car when 14 and drove it ? 

It would depend on the circumstances you met, the law, its officers, your ignorances and the challenges coming. It would not be wise...

It COULD lead to a life in irons, not necessarily punitive, but medical. It could embarrass the family reputation. It could cause great grief to the parents, and to the wrong-doer. It does represent reckless abuse of authority, by its entire absence, and in terms of property, contravention.
 

In the actual case, there is no authority so to treat what man did not make, does not make, and in view of his not making it, is intervening in God's processes as presented, to make. It is BECAUSE he cannot do it, that he is - to use an old Army term - commandeering it, or 'scrounging' it. There is no warrant, no guarantee; but there is presumption.

What would happen to that normally inseparably annexed spirit^*1A in man, which comes into its full functioning as the equipment enables it, the body and brain ? (cf. SMR pp. 348ff., 18ff., 316Dff., Ch. 4 and Little Things Ch. 5, The Other News  5). It is IMPOSSIBLE to tell, for the simple reason that this depends ENTIRELY on the good graces and will of God. If you tell God you are in need, and are covenantally related through His only begotten Son, the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, then there are promises which apply, there is an invitation so to act, and there are purposes in the proceeding (as in II Peter 1, John 14:13). It is to be done in His name SO THAT the Father may be glorified in the Son, and there are detailed provisions for character growth in relatedness to Christ, and as in I Corinthians 10:13, for strength or deliverance directly, according to the case.

When however without warrant, without a basis in Christ, without the word of God, but with respect to HIS CREATION, you presume to act so that an asexually procreated product is presented by putting your hands into the works He has made for a clearly defined purpose by an equally clearly defined program: then that is a form of theft, of waywardness, of presumption, intrusion and abuse of someone else's property. IF your INTENTION is to make organs, for the sick, then your LIMIT without such presumption is to make them directly; for the moment you make some sort of another parallel to the programmed sexual reproduction, in some product, then HIS OWNERSHIP of the property He created, is violated by UNAUTHORISED action contrary to OBVIOUS specifications.

It would be immoral and in one sense blasphemous: that is, it would put in the place of God's authority, relative to His property, not merely your own, but yours in parallel with His*2, so that the joint product would be like a partnership except for this, that only ONE partner has expressed willingness, and the partner who OWNS, is not on record with an answer!

That would normally be called theft; and when ONE partner is God, it would have a derogation by inference, of His ownership which would amount to evil ascriptions, presumptuous downgrading of His place, and hence technically blasphemy. God has given man a mind which has the powers to think, in wisdom, or in whatever irrationality he may choose to abuse it (cf. Repent or Perish Ch. 7, SMR Ch. 3, That Magnificent Rock Ch. 5); and man may use that mind in following on and seeking to understand the works of God, quite rightly : the fit is purpose-bound.

However when the' work' is in re-structuring what God has made, not merely remedy for the proliferations of sin within the laws and procedures God has ordained, or realisation of His gifts: then the moral issue arises. This ? It is not some intrusion or invasion; it is man alone who can be capable of that, in his relationship to his Maker, who is his absolute Creator, and whose patience and mercy is so prodigious that it is almost beyond conception. Nor is it some undue reduction of hedonistic autonomy, which is involved, through insatiable sovereignty or some such cacaphonic concept. It is simply this: God has made man and given him a mind for its place, not for becoming his own god, or making himself one.

Presumption in this, is mere misuse of gifts, and this leads to the consequences of insurrection. It is pitiable in consequence, poignant in folly, but inevitable in result, when mercy is ignored, when repentance is dismissed or even disdained.

Indeed, it is one of the most constant verifications of Biblical Christianity as the word of God, that His wisdom and consistency as Creator is constantly attested: He does not permit licence to make of this world a thing of utter folly, but judges, restrains, predicts, provides as in Christ; nor does He so inhibit and restrict as to prevent the very image of God in man from having any application at all. On the contrary, His patience (cf. II Peter 3:9) in view of the provocations (cf. Psalm 106) is so intense, so spectacular, and so immensely lovable, that one is inspired to seek to develop in this respect. His co-ordination of mercy and patience, carefully programmed for man to behold in the 'opera' book, the Bible, is with provision for intelligence and repentance a donation so ample, so liberal, that the word takes on a new meaning. It is amplitude with understanding, limitless lovingkindness with an end to folly, it is like nothing else. That! it is what you expect of your infinite Creator; it is what you get. THAT! it is verification.

The presumption however, of which we have been speaking, this too is verification, for it is precisely such an outcome which is predicted as a preliminary to the predicted return of the Saviour as sovereign (as in Psalm 72, Isaiah 11, Zechariah 6, 14, II Timothy 3, I Timothy 4, II Peter 2, II Thessalonians 2; and see Answers to Questions Ch. 5, Biblical Blessings Ch. 2, SMR Ch. 8).
 
 

THE BY-PRODUCTS OF PRESUMPTION

There has of course been a long lead up to such presumption (which is not known to have occurred as yet, but the way yawns open for one more masquerade in divine regalia, for this pitiful race). The test tube babies, as they are called, in which ingredients are put together outside the womb, are a movement to the end in view now. In this case, if the parties are willing, and if the ingredients are from those already married, then it resembles a therapeutic procedure in this, that something is not working, which is given assistance in working by facilitating action for those very things. If either procreative ingredient comes from an outside source, of course, it is a biological parallel to fornication and is hence not in line with the directives in the Bible on that topic.

Marriage is the Biblically indispensable basis for child-production, and failure in one way or another in the womb, still allows for such a case, the joining of the engendering members in another milieu, provided they are in fact from those so married. If not, then the case varies from this authorised basis.

Therapy is always one thing; and re-direction of affairs is another.

Thus,  when this procedure is used, in vitrio, for NON married, or for NON therapeutic reasons, it is still interference a) with the moral law and b) with the limits of healing as distinct from imperious adjustments at WILL.

Thus WHEN AND IF it becomes possible to make direct some organ, without the intervention of a living being:  that has no apparent moral problems. IF it involves a baby, it does have them, to put it in marked under-statement,  as noted above; and IF it involves for a baby,  its death or mutilation, then this involves even more enormity; and to call them 'problems' is more than euphony in such a case. The reality is of the highest magnitude of presumption and interference, and in the end, comes to theft.

But what MIGHT happen if what were to be done was not the more grievous than simple abortion murder case, just noted, but the actual 'making' of a child to grow into an adult ?

Numbers of things might happen, just as with the 14 year old with the car.

The first thing of course is that presumption and theft occurs. You are taking what is not yours and making up ideas about its utilisation which are yours. It is as simple as that. You are not then helping:  in the earlier case, it is a matter of murdering life, and in the latter for the whole being to adult, you are masquerading with it. You are acting as source, or sovereign or both.  But you are neither, and in this setting, it is a kind of lie (cf. II Thess. 2:11). That comes, as you see in this chapter of Thessalonians, from an initial refusal to receive the truth. All sorts of results accrue, and this would be one road for their occurrence.

Thus, were such an asexually created being to occur, there are results. What are they ?  First, then, the situation in view: You are seeing what will come when certain technical facilities provided are caused to act without warrant, guidance or control, without authority and with an impudent insertion of the mind you were given, into the bodily apparatus you were given.

1) It COULD lead to a new thing: the non-automatic might replace the automatic, and the spirit might not be given. This is far from a necessary result; it is possible. When you are misusing your senior's property, it is hard to know just what he will do; when He is GOD, there is no limit. He is very deep, and not in a hurry. Things sometimes develop over a sunny period of apparent reward for presumption, only to end in a huge exposure and the uttermost grief.

2) There might be some deformity in the equipment, some gross or subtle omission which would be a fitting rebuke to the presumption. It could become like a pianist trying to play on a piano which lacked pedals, or top, or keys. Enormous numbers of affliction are possible. Life is in this case is becoming a play thing; and as the history of our race should tell even the most superficial, it is decidedly not, repeat not, a plaything. Rather is it a purposively produced entity of the gravest significance which, if ignored, makes the heaviest conceivable inroads into the spirit of man in individual, family, social or national catastrophe.

3) The omission, if any, could lead to new forms of manipulability. It is not necessary; it is simply one divine option, and it might or might not be associated with some later clear case of a reason for it, at the technical level. It could be an equipment failure or a divine non-co-operation. God is not forced to favour theft with beauty - or predictability, for that matter!

In time, perhaps, it might occur to the life-violators to make nerves with subtle DNA changes, if they can manipulate them adequately, better fitted for relationship to electronic fittings and so on.

The political possibilities in kind have been explored already somewhat, in The Other News  5.
 
 

THE WORLD OF WOES

These things are so, and we have earlier looked at both the certainty of creation, and the effervescent emptiness of conceptions that the work is done by a non-worker (cf. SMR Ch. 2 and Ch. 1; That Magnificent Rock Chs.  1 and  8; A Spiritual Potpourri Chs. 1-9, Wake Up World! Your Creator is Coming ... Chs.  4,  5,  7 and Stepping Out for Christ Chs.  2,  7,  8,  9,  10 and other sites as noted in Index), as well as the certainty that God has spoken to His self-dismembering creation called man. (This calamitous cutting - not all do it! but the avenues are numerous, psychic, financial, spiritual, moral, physical and so on, so that the results are pandemic and in proportion, all but engulfing. Revelation shows just HOW engulfing they will in fact become.)

Now we are looking merely at the perspective of such developments, in particular.

Many will complain of the ordeals for the race which are being divinely prepared as noted in the book of Revelation, and are already very apparent as frequently brought to the attention of reader's on this site (as in Answers to Questions Ch. 5, SMR Ch. 8). However, WHEN you not ONLY do evil, presume, ignore, dismiss, dispense with God (in theory, you could not in fact cf. Divine Agenda Chs.  1,  4, Acme, Alpha and Omega: Jesus Christ Ch. 8, and REFUSE to repent, it is a very special case.

To do evil is one thing; to do it with depth and depravity is another; but it is yet again a different thing, a far more vicious and detestable thing, more contemptible to the truth of the Almighty (as seen in Daniel 12) when you REFUSE to REPENT. This simply means that either

·       1) you would do it all again, or

·       2) even if you might not, you do not accept any responsibility for your action, so blaming your maker for your evil, and assaulting His name.

This of course is stabbing the doctor who is offering the operation, and it is quite morally useless, to say no more, to accuse him of lack of this or that, while he is in hospital (the imagery for the crucifixion before the resurrection), or if he does not undertake to operate in view of your refusal and violence, aggravated insult and assault, with self-will and self-assertion: a sort of complex brew of folly, intoxicated and alien to all good.

The 'you' in this case, is in large measure the whole world. It does not repent. It continues with pharisaic complacency, sadducaic disbelief and presumption, Herodian politics and Caiaphas kinds of procedures, on its far from merry way. The world is bringing on itself two things.

The first is increasingly unmitigated evil, catastrophes apparent in the simple and obvious case of the ozone layer destruction, aggravated itself in slowness to adapt, the US being at the present in arrears in insisting on this and that instead of making a lead, when it contributes so much to the problem. It is apparent equally in the radioactive contamination, when man has thrown caution to the winds along with the radiation, and adversely affected perhaps millions of children already, a special gift of which Russia is a highly contaminating source via the Arctic, Lake Baikal and Chernobyl.

The second ? It is the divine rebuke. You see the preconditions for this in Revelation 9:20ff., where despite the divine wrath from the woeful miscreancy of the human race in vast proportions, there is NO REPENTANCE. Now repentance is not merely a feeling of regret: for that is remorse. The Greek word indicates a total change of heart, mind and direction. It is biblically used in the phrase, moreover, "repentance into life" as in Acts 11:18. This shows that it is going somewhere, and life is that destination!

God is there noted to have granted to Gentiles this action of activated remorse, co-ordinated change which cumulatively, turning from the things of old, the ways, the values, enters in this contrition into the domain of life itself, through the redemption in Christ made available to all who should come, who, of course, in the foreknowledge of God, are already paid for! (Romans 8:32, I John 2:2, Romans 8:29ff., Ephesians 1:4, Isaiah 53). The movements of God are precise and knowledgeable, and this is no exception. His provisions are adequate for all, paid for those redeemed. He does not redeem the unredeemed, or pay for those who do not, and will not know Him. As always, He covers REPENTED sin, and remits by payment, what comes to sacrifice with FAITH. This has been and remains always, the way. It is deep, it is not a mere human vagary.
 
 

THE WORLD OF DIVINE BENEDICTION IS NOT LOST:
BUT THIS PRESENT WORLD WILL BE

Moreover, repentance is like the stones on the path of return, and redemption is like the door at the end of the path. You do not COME to the door without repentance, and you cannot get in without faith, nor would it help you if you had even that, if you did not have a door in which to have faith, for heaven and its kingdom are not penetrated by presumption, but by invitation, repentance, faith and redemption.

THAT, it is the performance of Christ (Hebrews 7-10) who purchased eternal redemption for those who receive it, in eternity covered by His costing in the Cross.

How far from these are the presumptions we have just been considering. How far from these are the attitudes so imperviously, so remorselessly, intransigeantly and inexorably chosen by those who constantly write RSPV's to the God of creation, by their misuse of it and of each other, and as constantly ignore or seek to abort the consequences by endless talk, whether in philosophy or in meetings national and international. Here the waftings of presumption can even be coded into pseudo-moral laws, made so simply by convenience, God Himself being treated either as such or as an impediment, or even an excrescence, while the wicked dig the pit, as the Bible declares, for the time to come. It is deep, in that case; for there has long been much energy put into it.

TO COMPLAIN becomes virtual insanity, but it is not the merely mental variety (Hosea 9:7), and the most brilliant can fall into this pit: it is spiritual. It is lèse-majesté, it is hideous oversight, it is as if an orphan being accepted by a kindly family, constantly used the family car and ignored the head of the house. When what might have been is considered, and that the whole is dependent on mercy from first to last, then the abhorrence of the conduct makes it a marvel the orphan is still in the house at all. What creates the condition of orphan ? Sin.

That ? It is deflection of direction, disqualification of quality, disharmony of spirit with God, disbelief in reality, falling far short of the glory of God, rebellion against His clear revelation, rejection of His sacrificed Son, these are some of its ingredients. It cancels all would-be visas and removes all mere creation appropriations. Mercy only remains, and this becomes sovereign, majestic, sure, effectual when it is taken where it is definitively given, in the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, who showed the exact opposite of presumption, in becoming man that man might become adopted by God, as many as received Him.

However man proceeds until the house is removed, and the family of God proceeds to its eternal precincts (I Cor. 15:56ff., II Cor. 4:16-5:1ff.). It is like a prolonged lung cancer case, where the treatment is abhorred and the condition is abhorrent. The glory is this: it is one thing - the correction is still individually available. The time is not even now, too late. It comes to people, one by one, just like an operation. Someone else cannot have the correction in his or her body, for you (Psalm 49:7,15); but on the other hand, this highly personal and private aspect, becomes public once the operation is over, and you are begotten into the family of God by His word (I Peter 1:21), so that HIS SEED remains in you (I John 3:9).

This is one operation which even the grisly hands of presuming man cannot touch; though they make trial of it, as in masses and seedy ceremonialism, sacerdotalism, liberalism, neo-orthodoxy, neo-evangelicism and any other thing contrary to sound doctrine, Biblical teaching (cf. The Kingdom of Heaven Appendix, Chs.  3 and  8, SMR pp. 732B, 821, 833, 861, Answers to Questions 8, pp. 214ff.). However, there is this one result: it does not work. It is merely a word.

It is not a work. ONLY GOD in His own way makes the work that lasts, and by His Spirit He applies it. Man has spirit; God IS a Spirit, and none can imitate His actions, though many may without authority seek to intervene. His throne is the pre-condition of man's existence; and He, being always what He would be, and having no limits, continues unchanged. It is man who must change; or the changes will rung on him, not in impossible and misconceived events doing work without working capacity, but by God who works all things after the counsel of His own will.
 

• "Make a joyful shout to the LORD, all you lands!

Serve the LORD with gladness;
Come before His presence with singing.

"Know that the LORD, He is God;
It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;
We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.
Enter into His gates with thanksgiving,
And into His courts with praise,
be thankful to Him, and bless His name.

"For the LORD is good:
His mercy is everlasting,
And His truth endures to all generations."
 

Thus are ancient words of Psalm 100, applicable to modern man, and their wisdom is his proper vision, while the Spirit of God, never changing, makes applicable to man, not the incestuous relationships with NATURE, which are of the nature of combined tragedy and farce, defilement, defacement, and abominable blindness that seduces and secures folly as if it were fairy floss for greedy children: not these, but the truth (John 16:7-15). This is firstly and with unique authority never countermanded or withdrawn, in those ancient Biblical words: prescriptive, analytical, applicable to mankind; and then by His Spirit, applied, so that the truth comes home, and home for many, may come to be the truth.

It is a glory of life, that it is personal; it is a wonder that it is adequate; it is natural that it is supernatural, since nothing else could make Nature (cf. SMR, That Magnificent Rock); and it is a culmination for admiration, that our Source overpassing all our desire (Isaiah 11:10), should in creating us, have given us such desire, that it might be sated.

Not then in passing things is stability and wisdom to be found; or in making asses of ourselves by exercising ourselves in things to high for us (Psalm 131), but in care and prudence, according to the word of God, may we safely proceed, not in the perplexities of taking upon ourselves divine dealings as if we were apt to play God, but in the assurances of following what He has given, no absentee landlord, but the provider for all the needs of His people. To avoid the transition from spiritual vagrant to child of God, is as needless as is its presence fatal to restraint, understanding and life (John 1:12, Hebrews 2). Much that vexes man is symptomatic of that avoidance; and it is not void that the avoidance of truth brings to man.
 
 

NOTES

*1A
The incredible (except for the leaven of irrational liberalism, which makes all but anything credible) fantasy that the Old Testament did not have a concept of spirit for man, but only had a body mind situation, should here be summarily dealt with; for although it is not strictly relevant, since the spirit of man is a frequent and clear subject in both testaments, yet it is well to iron out the wrinkles and smooth the crinkles of erratic culture at such a point.

In the Old Testament the word transliterated ruah, is used both of God and of man. God by His SPIRIT moved on the face of the waters, in the essential activities of creation. These of course involve thought, understanding and technical skill, as often demonstrated on this site, far beyond our own, in terms of the product, part of this being ourselves!

God's Spirit, says Genesis 6, would not always strive with man. Hence the meaning is personal, susceptible to emotion, thought, action, intention, purpose, performance of the same. It is precisely what was meant, is meant and continues to be meant. The man, in whom God placed spirit, being in His image, and He being Spirit, man obviously has a participation in the qualities so derived, so named. Means of expression in symbolic form, such as we use continually ourselves, as in 'breathed life into his work', and so on, do not alter the fact beyond all figure, of which the actions and meanings speak for themselves.

Thus in Proverbs we find that the spirit of a man is the candle of the Lord by which He searches his thoughts (Proverbs 20:27), that the Lord forms the spirit of man within him (Zechariah 12:1), weighs the spirits (16:2) by which it clearly not meant a laboratory scaling but a consideration of their ways! that "he who rules his spirit" is better than he who takes a city (16:32), by which is not meant that if you do well in respiratory exercises you have more to you than a city conqueror! A haughty spirit in 16:18 has its results, while he who is of a humble spirit is commended (16:19 cf. Isaiah 66:2).

Who, accordingly, asks the Lord, has directed the Spirit of the LORD ? while on the Messiah in His earthly mission, we read "I have put My Spirit" on Him - Isaiah 42:1 (and He does not have this Spirit by measure, in view of His Deity -John 3:34). Again in 44:3, we find that the LORD will pour out His Spirit on the thirsty person, and His blessing in accord with that. Of the Egyptians we learn that their horses are flesh and not spirit (Isaiah 31:3). This is in itself fascinating. Spirit and flesh, power of muscle and surging clamour is contrasted entirely with the sort of power which appertains to God, and which by the human spirit can manifest itself in works as in Samson, but ones which are divinely manifested from a different domain. The miraculous can result, whether in understanding or in direct power (Psalm 139:7, Micah 3:8, Judges 14:6, Zechariah 4:6), and certainly a godly consequence is to be looked for in such inner actions from the Lord by His Spirit (Micah 2:7, Isaiah 61:3, 57:15); and further, an evil spirit can be sent upon the vulnerable, because rebellious spirit of a man (I Samuel 18:10).  The LORD indeed is the God of all the spirits of flesh (which is thereby as a total gamut, in contrast), and this in the context of sin, and its consequences.

This is the consistent testimony of the Bible to what we have frequently shown to be the spirit of man, in contradistinction to mind and body (see some of the references in the lines following this note).

Similarly the Lord observes in Isaiah 61:1 the compassion, control, power, prerogatives and performances wrought in Him, as the Spirit of the Lord is upon Him.

In I Thessalonians 5:23, we find man to be spirit, soul (or life) and body, while in I Cor. 14, we find that the spirit of a man is able to worship, but should be used in concordance with his mind, although, in terms of pathology, the mind may have been alienated, in which case, the purging of his spirit is a proper procedure in the restoration of his mind (I Cor. 14:15, Ephesians 4:17-24, II Cor. 7:1, Psalm 51:10).

The spirit of a man is accountable, responsible, responsive or unresponsive, deceitful, lying or corrupted, gentle or evil (cf. Zechariah 13:2, Isaiah 29:10, 63:14, Micah 2;11, Psalm 32:2). The Lord put life into the dry bones in the vision of Ezekiel 37, and so brought life to mere form, and a new heart and a new spirit is the gift of those who find the Messiah in the New Covenant (Ezekiel 18:31 with 16:60ff., and Jeremiah 31:31 with Zechariah 6:12ff., and Jeremiah 3:17 with 23:5ff.). Gentleness of spirit is one of the gifts of the Spirit of the Lord (Galatians 5:22), and to err in spirit is precisely the prerogative of spirit, which is not a utensil of DNA, or of culture, or of thought, but an entity directly related to God, able to be imbued from him, burdened with concerns,  or embroiled in the concerns of the flesh (Ephesians 5:22, II Cor. 3:3, I Tim. 4:1, James 4;5). Through the Spirit of the Lord, man may mortify the diseases of his own spirit (Romans 8:13), in the name, power and terms of the covenant donation of Christ.

See also SMR pp. 316Dff., 422Eff. and News 122 , 111, Little Things Ch. 5.
 

*1
Verbally, the term 'apostasy' as used here is generic, and to some may seem  a little unusual.
However, it is used with design, and advisedly in this context.

Often it refers to a departure from one's normal religious profession, provided this has due claim to be orthodox in the sense of non-deviant from the authority of God.

However, the actual MEANING of the word in Webster, is "a total desertion of, or departure from, one's religion, principles, party , cause etc.". Its Greek root is defection, revolt. To this is added the 'apo' (transliterated).

It is the totality of the desertion which makes the word applicable. In this case, the 'party' is the human race, and principles are those of which it is constituted, a sufficient basis for 'orthodoxy':  its creation components and their due servicing and treatment, usage and non-abuse, as in the hand-book given to the race, as demonstrated in SMR Chs. 1 -3, 10 in particular, and elsewhere on this site.

*2
It is with no small rejoicing that one finds in the Reader's Digest article, the statement that, relative to the cloning of a human being,  "Ian Wilmut ... remains steadfast that, however tragic, there is no human loss that could justify this." This admirable restraint is most reasonable and just. It was he who is presented as being profoundly involved in the technical advances in knowledge which relate.

Extract B

 from Ancient Words, Modern Deeds Ch. 13

 

 

CHAPTER 13

PURPOSE-CHANCE

The Evacuation of Chance, except for Purpose:
and then BY Purpose
and ON Purpose

 

System ? Very good, programmed ? By whom ? Not programmed ? How then system ?
Just WAS ? But magic is neither logic nor scientific method. What has inherent controls and constraints without a ground for them is merely magical, an alogism, an irrationality comparable to all the efforts in that direction so often made by man, as when he tried to have spontaneous generation of life, shown false by Pasteur.

You cannot create by creating an illogical image; except of course by 'create', you MEAN the illogical model, image itself; but in that case, alas, it is not the universe which you create, or for which you give grounds for existing, but only your own creativity as part of that creation which is the universe - scarcely a refutation.

No chance is to be found in the system. It has laws, rules, potentials, contrivances, relationships, constraints; and what these permit will occur when the permission operates now this way, now that, as diverse associations, groupings, collocations come from time to time

Inherent associative criteria, such as requisitioned by DNA when a baby is being programmed physically for birth, these are no chance. They are offspring of rules, and powers, and criteria and constraints, and blueprints in code, and controls for the execution of the same, and editing to ensure the better performance of the same, all in precisely the fashion so many human beings would LOVE to make, if they could, in their sheer sophistication of understanding and complexity of contrivance, in their multi-purpose arrangements and their intimately miniaturised provisions.

In our system ALL possibilities ARE, and they are IN the construction.

The irony is this: that it is ONLY in the presence of purpose that 'chance' is meaningful overall concept; and it is not overall!

It means, quite simply, this: that to a person of purpose, things can happen, for good or evil (i.e. benefit or calamity) from NO purpose of that person. This or that event can fall like a balm or a bane. Far form any plan, aspiration or program of his/her own, things may occur, which will aid, even abet or threaten, or indeed frustrate some purpose or plan of the purposeful person.
 
 

GIVING CHANCE A CHANCE ?

Relative to such a person's PURPOSE, this is conceived of as a chance contribution: it was not purposed by this party at all. In that context, the term has meaning: but the irony is this, that it is only in the presence of purpose that 'chance' can have meaning.

At that, it is a vanishing meaning, as soon as one's conception moves to the WHOLE. Then there ARE persons with  imagination and purpose, capable of error, and there is a system and indeed a series of systems, which may/may not further the purposes of the person or persons.

It is not then a chance system in the least degree: there are purposes and systems, and the latter may jar on your purposes, or not: more or less.

Here lies the limit: WHEN you do not KNOW the author both of persons and systems, the adequate cause (cf. Ch. 9 *6, above) then, the latter may affront, tragically indeed, the purposes of the former. When however you DO know Him, then needless collisions may be avoided though some can help engender patience, humility, and so can act as an antidote to arrogance, perhaps there without its being realised!

It is, in fact, exactly as outlined in Psalm 1 and Romans 5.

This is one example of which many brothers and systems have been noted as in SMR Ch. 3,   pp. 422Eff., Ch. 2 Extension, and TMR Ch. 7.  As to others, as we have repeatedly seen, philosophy has contortions, because of distortions.

Remove the distortions and farewell the contortions. Simplicity (relatively) replaces the distortions, contortions and abortions of systems which do not work because they offend causality while yet using it (cf. SMR op. cit. and Ch. 5).

Trying to do what is systematically impossible, this always produces contortions (watch a tennis match when one party is stretched rather BEYOND the limit, having NOTHING with which to meet the onslaught/assault plan of the other competitor. 'Nothing' does not do much for the case, in physics or tennis; and the more you consider it, the less game goes...
 
 

CHASING CHANCE OR LETTING IT CHASE!

Find God, then every fact and facet not only fits into place, with the sort of ease that one finds in a jigsaw puzzle when having studied for hours, and moved it pieces vainly and anon frustratingly about, one finds the picture-perspective needed (cf. Luke 5:4-6). With almost absurd simplicity, one piece then follows another, with facility and order: the picture is complete. How could one have been so slow before!

Thus when you find purpose, you can understand 'chance'; but only in the presence and perspective afforded by purpose. But then, finding purpose, you look to the origin of all, and so find that no such thing as chance exists, EXCEPT in the unseemly or unrealised contributions of various systems to one's purposes, and these the more impactively the less one knows the Lord. Once Elisha mused to himself of something which had happened and of which the Lord had not told him! (II Kings 4:27). This indeed might seem like a 'chance'; but even here, the prophet realised that even though to him it had come unannounced, it was not without God, who knows all and in particular controls the outcomes for His people, also sometimes relaxing controls for those who reject Him so that their own impotence and impudence might the more obviously strike their consciences, if so be they elect to ... think! That is precisely what Psalm 1 is teaching.

Like "the chaff" which the wind blows away, the wicked are then depicted as becoming. That assuredly seems like 'chance', but it is not a systematic oblivion, but a detachment of purposeful intervention, and an attachment of systematic impacts for the lives of those who abscond from God, so that their purposes are naked and exposed, little battlements of personality in the midst of unseeing forces which God, the Lord has made as part of the home of man, the arena for divine prescience and human habitation.

It is rather like a little child. One remembers one little aboriginal boy, daring and charming, aged about 2, who was very affectionate. He would pat the cheeks of my wife lovingly when she would catch him from danger on the road, lest a car should strike him, on occasion. In his innocence of exploits and achievements in a funny and inviting world, as it probably seemed to him, he set off one day and managed to go over the creek on the bridge, up the other side, and proceed towards a rather major artery up on a far hill. Full marks for initiative, but rather less for what MIGHT have happened because the world is NOT automatically controlled for his benefit. Kindness intervened in Christ, for his benefit to be sure, but sometimes such exploits have another end!

The more man behaves like that in his universe musings and cruisings, out of place, out of mind almost in his presumption, exploring the exploits of the divine majesty with undaunted enthusiasm and quite often now, with  no authority (cf. Repent or Perish Ch. 6, A Spiritual Potpourri
Chs. 1-3), the more he conforms to type, in the last centuries. Whatever is there, he seeks; and whatever he finds, he tends to exploit, as the Spanish Romanists did with the Incas in a situation so abusive and profoundly exterminative, grabbing wealth and assassinating people, that it is nearly worthy of weeping, for such an end to such a civilisation for such purposes and programs as these. They did this; many others did other things not entirely better, as in the American and earlier British slavery exhibits!

The CHANCE may indeed appear as the uninvited guest, to swell the coffers, or bring the curse, as in the American Civil War, or the Spanish Armada, when Spain would have made Britain slaves in the interests of the pope, as to some extent many had been in a good measure earlier, with boy bishops drawing salaries they did not bother to come to the Island to earn, and 'Peter's pence' departing for foreign fields, while heads rolled for foreign purposes, and foreign-made idols were bound on the consciences of the people, or else in many cases, they were bound and their bodies put beyond repair.

The divine reticence in such cases can be profound to humiliate the sheer spiritual madness of the presumptions being made; or indeed, the Lord may intervene most purposefully, using or not, at His entire pleasure, systems in place or added work, as in the Exodus, where He laboured in a special and sequential way, leading up to a separating of families, and a requisition of communication from man to God, in the form of blood ON or NOT ON the door of the people who claimed His mercy, before Israel departed the land! (cf. Exodus 12-15, Psalm 78, Psalm 106).

Again, the divine plan sets in with its profound precision, according to all the wisdom of God, to answer prayer as at Dunkirk, in the case of the Spanish Armada, or to rebuke evil, as with Hitler's demise, his own mental condition contributing not a little to the defeat of his armies when the Stalingrad folly was perpetrated. (Cf. Psalm 50:20-23.)

But chance is not a real thing; it is merely the appearance of what is made to proceed on various premises, logical and physical, chemical and biogenic, or on various promises which may be invoked, in the Book of the Creator, the Bible. Here the systems may be conceived of as impactive without purpose, when, in fact, the extent to which this is allowed, is the PRODUCT of PURPOSE; for even the permission for this or that impact of system on human personality is conceived in terms of grace or disgrace, of blessing or cursing, of hope or stimulus; for God works ALL things after the counsel of His own will (Ephesians 1:11).
 
 

THE ELOQUENCE OF IRONY

'Chance' is, to be sure, useful in being indicative of system's actions on purposes of people, or angelic beings; but it is not a creative unit; merely a dissociation of divine control with intervention, over certain things, to the point that their outcome IS the result of divine control. This means simply that HIS PERMISSION for things to proceed in their own created way, like a housewife who does not clean the bedroom as a rebuke to the household, enables things to wreak havoc, but this allowance is the product of purpose ... to do just that!

It is an irony. If HE takes His hand off certain implications and consequences of certain follies, in order to show the weakness of man recklessly adrift, like a tiny boat on a huge sea or ocean, so be it: THAT is a decision, not chance. The play of what is thought of as chance, in the absence of understanding of the mind of God, is in fact a personal permission, for the impact of a systematic consequence, that persons might learn or show or be tested, thus and so, and find the necessity of being linked PERSONALLY to the PERSON who made indeed the stage, with its systems and scopes, constraints and restraints; but made persons to act on it.

They are the players; that is what is primarily is FOR, its purpose. When they worship the stage, that stage may be a fatal one, and involve collapses of the same in various ways, in order to teach them better things to do with their time. It may indeed be very pointed, as in the greenhouse effect: the stage became so prominent with materialism, evolutionism, naturalism, that its contributions to human discomfort is a comforting exposure: perhaps they will listen and look and think awhile. WHO wants the actors to fail so ignominiously as all that! Rebuke can be far better than ruin! Mercifully it is coming first!

Thus it is only when by wisdom, chance is permitted its scope, that system aborts freely on personality; but then it is wisdom which allocates to the systems such liberty, and so 'chance' is merely the impact of such liberties as and when and if the divine hand grants them. At that, they do not control, but merely evidence the lack of personal intervention in what has been made as it is, and contains all it can do, neither more nor less, and is here permitted to DO it.

For the Christian there are many ways in which his life can glorify God, including slow torture, such as on the Cross of Christ, and poverty such as many have. But what is NOT needed is 'chance', except as a swift reminder of the poverty of puny pride, as it afflicts a man as it did poor Amasa (II Chronicles 25:17ff.) or before that, of the error of lassitude of faith, as with ungrateful Asa!  (II Chronicles 16:3ff.).

THAT, however, is meaningful only as the withholding of purpose, so that BY PURPOSE, the impact of the world's internal operations might be made, to the awakening of wisdom on the one blind, or blurred in vision.

Chance is then a by-product of the presence of purpose in terms of contrast; and when man is with the Lord, it is not normally needing invocation; though for the unsaved, it may be permitted to play a huge role, as the divine hand exposes more and more the object of divine rebuke or wrath, to the events which come 'naturally'. At that, however, there is an overall control on the outcomes and the issuance of all possibilities, as you see in Revelation 9, and indeed in the entire discourse from Revelation 6-9, 15-16, as events are released by order, so that the equipment so exposed to service, implements itself in due order.

As Amos puts it (3:3-8):
 

• "Can two walk together, unless they are agreed ?

Will a lion roar in the forest, when he has no prey ?
Will a young lion cry out of his den, if he has caught nothing ?

"Will a bird fall into a snare on the earth, where there is no trap for it ?
Will a snare spring up from the earth, if it has caught nothing at all ?

"If a trumpet is blown in a city , will not the people be afraid ?
If there is calamity in a city, will not the LORD have done it ?
Surely he Lord God does nothing,
Unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets."
 

Comparative possibilities in a programmed system are one thing; they are interesting but uncreative. Absolute characterisations are another. Here chance is out till purpose is in; and when purpose is in, the spiritual site of its fabrication is found logically with necessity, though spiritually it may still be disdained, as is usual with many. It is then however that chance is cast out again, replaced through divine design if so be, by untutored circumstance, where this is the method employed by the Person in charge; or by guidance (as with Joseph and Mary sent to Egypt as Matthew shows, with the infant Jesus escaping infanticide, since His death was scheduled for a later and more significant season), or other^*1 intervention; and it is all governed by grace for His children. "Precious" indeed is the death of the saints of the Lord! (Psalm 116:15).

They have a purpose and are undismissible till it is done.

So does the universe.

As a stage, it is thrilling, as an object of worship, it is trite and more than a little ridiculous! This is done directly or indirectly, the latter in naturalism, that modern replica of the obsessive renegacies of old.
 
 

NOTES

*1
The case of Ahab and Jehoshaphat, when that latter godly king was foolishly entwined with the wicked King of Israel at that time, indeed has him in flagrant disobedience to the portent of the word of God, as his father in law, is instructive here.

In true wicked form, Ahab had dressed in common garb in the joint battle of the two temporary allies, thus being likely to escape concentrated attack by the enemy; while Jehoshaphat had not done so. Such an alliance! such ... togetherness! The Lord saw this, and knew HIS mind toward Ahab who had been warned and helped time and again, so that it was a saga of spiritual grace of God toward him, and of endless machinations of the unconverted heart in the face of such tender regard. At last his time had come.

But would not King Jehoshaphat we the fall-guy, and would he not be killed in view of this deadly stratagem ? Not at all. When pursued as he undoubtedly was, being mistaken for the King of Israel, he cried to the Lord, who heard him. How odd it seems at the time when seemingly impossible burdens or enemies cry out against one, and then, the burden goes and the victory comes! So on this occasion with Jehoshaphat! But the Lord had other plans also, than merely to deliver his erring child, Jehoshaphat.

A man drew a bow "at random" (II Kings 22:34), to see if he could send some fire into the midst of the embroiled battle. That simply meant this: that he did not aim at anyone in particular. HE did not, but the LORD knew what HE was doing.

Well, the man presumably mused that someone would be hit as his arrow hovered, flew on  and flitted to its end in the enemy lines. Just so! 'By chance' it was Ahab. Chance ? yes in the sense defined above: an event for good or evil relative to the purposes of some purposeful being, which comes without his/her cry, call or intervention. In fact, however, as soon as we establish its RELATIVE position as chance, we find its ABSOLUTE position as directed. It was God who had in DETAIL predicted that the blood of Ahab would be licked by dogs. THIS was the episode which led directly to that foreordained and predicted end.

Ahab was taken in his chariot, being severely wounded, and soon died. When the chariot was washed, the blood came with the water and the dogs licked it. So IN DETAIL was a prophecy in LIKE DETAIL fulfilled under divine and sovereign direction, through an act, in the mind of the soldier whose arrow did the killing, merely 'at random', an unsighted target found by the arrow of divinely appointed destiny, in the divinely appointed time (as we shall see) to lead to the divinely predicted blood being eaten in the divinely appointed place by the divinely stated means (I Kings 21:19). All this was predicted. The means varied; the result did not because it could not. It was governed by God, who "works all things after the counsel of His own will" (Ephesians 1:11).

Time, place, blood, method of removal of same, all were assigned before the 'random' sending of the arrow of death.

In fact, the prophet Micaiah had directly prophesied that Ahab would NOT return in peace from the battle. The way that happened in instructive. The more Ahab blew on the candle of the Lord, the more it flourished. Thus when the two kings before battle called, each one, for some prophet or prophets, Jehoshaphat - perhaps sensing the slavish servility to the king and his evil purposes, which the many false prophets called by Ahab forwarded, these protesting victory in the coming battle - asked for some other prophet. At this, Ahab noted with displeasure that the prophet Micaiah was still there, and that he could be called, adding that this prophet always spoke evil of him. 'Let not the king say so!' said his son-in-law with social grace.

Micaiah first of all pretended to agree with the evil prophets, but his tone presumably alerted Ahab to his mockery. Invoked to tell it, he then did so in a most poignant way, bringing to light his vision of the people of Israel like sheep without a shepherd (comment on Ahab and evil prophets). In this vision, now shared with all, Micaiah told the sequence. Thus, a misleading spirit had offered to entice Ahab to battle, so that he might die, and was given divine permission so to do. This message was received with dour malignance by Ahab. Indeed, he had Micaiah put in prison until he should return. "IF you ever return in peace," said Micaiah, "the Lord has NOT spoken by me!"

Ahab asked for witnesses to this, for if he DID return in victory, not in grief, then Micaiah would be identified as a false prophet to whom the death penalty would come, and doubtless with some relish, from Ahab according to the law (Deuteronomy 18:22).

The whole prophetic integrity of the prophet was thus backed by the Lord as HE promised (in Isaiah 44:25-26), for it is He who "confirms the word of His servant, and performs the counsel of His messengers", whilst He also "frustrates the signs of the babblers, and drives diviners mad," for it is He who "turns wise men backwards, and makes their knowledge foolishness".

The Lord acted as is His way, and Micaiah instead of being exhibited as a false prophet, was shown a true one, all by the 'random' act of an enemy soldier, who unwittingly, brought to pass the determinate and predicted counsel of the Lord. So did the Lord control in His overall planning with precision, events whether in a system or by intervention, as He pleased; and what was committed to be done through system, even if through the same used without direction by an intervening party, as here the soldier, is merely one part of a plan in which all the components, systematic or personal, are known and pre-arranged, so that the outcome is sure.

Neither system, without human direction, nor human use of system with purpose, can escape the simple fact that God knows all systems, all minds, all purposes, all ends, all aims, and can as readily, yes and far more so, entwine them as an engineer can work out the combinations of explosions on the one hand, and restraining devices to prevent their outcome being in this or that direction too markedly, in the demolition of buildings, or use men on the one hand, and machines on the other, in their construction.

The fact is that God who made all knows all, and men, in multitudes now in love with the stage, have forgotten that the play has a director.

It follows indirectly, just as it is stated directly, that those who are to be redeemed by the Lord are likewise known, and foreknown by Him (Ephesians 1:4); and in fact, they are statedly foreknown as His, before the world was created. It is time the power of God was realised afresh, for in the puny magnitudes of escalating technology, man who can be destroyed as a race by an asteroid, if God so allowed, has become prodigiously inflated in great numbers, imagining so freely that his little adjustments of the created marvels can bring this or that, when he does not even understand his own spirit (cf. SMR Ch. 4, Things Old and New Ch. 9, With Heart and Soul, Mind and Strength Ch. 11, pp. 168ff., and Ch. 1 above), because his eyes are, in masses and masses of cases, so tightly closed to the Lord, that the muscles are hurt in the process (as in SMR Ch. 3, pp. 422Eff., TMR Ch. 7).